


Travelin' Soldier

by spaceyho



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: M/M, Vietnam AU, jeanmarco, might give it a warning for later chapters, music fic, this is like total angst just fyi
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-09-30
Updated: 2014-09-30
Packaged: 2018-02-19 07:46:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,620
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2380451
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spaceyho/pseuds/spaceyho
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Marco Bodt is barely 18 when he gets drafted, and with no family, and no friends, he figures there's really no one to miss him when he's gone. Until he meets Jean Kirstien.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Travelin' Soldier

**Author's Note:**

> so this has been in my brain for aprox. seven years and i figured it was about time i wrote it. it is sad. it will only get sadder you have been warned.

For most people, birthdays were an excuse to celebrate; to have fun with friends and family. Especially a person’s eighteenth birthday was meant to be spend out, enjoying yourself, without a care in the world because you’d made it to adulthood, you survived this long in a world that seems hellbent on breaking you. This was not the case for one Marco Bodt. 

Marco didn’t really have much of a family. This wasn’t exactly sad for him most of the time. He’d gotten by on his own all right throughout school after his mom passed away, leaving him officially on his own. It was on his thirteenth birthday. From then on, Marco didn’t really celebrate birthdays. Usually instead, he made his way up to his mother’s grave, the one that lay next to his father’s and he’d sit for the day, bring a lunch, tell his parents how the year had been. He would have told them about his friends, but he didn’t really have any. He didn’t have time, between school during the day and working at night and weekends he was too busy.

Seeing as his eighteenth birthday would also be the fifth anniversary of his mothers death, he had been planning on making some kind of treat, maybe a cupcake or something, for himself to bring up to the grave to eat with his lunch.That was not what he did. 

The news had come December 1, 1969, almost exactly six months before his birthday. Having come back from shopping (if you could call it that; coffee, milk and bread weren’t much in terms of groceries) Marco set the measly bag on his equally as feeble kitchen table and flicked on the radio. It was sort of a habit of his to listen to the news as he did things around his small apartment, and even if putting away only three groceries didn’t take long, it was still relaxing.

Or at least that was the idea. Instead of hearing the weather or how traffic was as he expected, there was a very official voice crackling through his speakers. This caught Marco’s attention as he paused with the refrigerator door open, milk in hand. The word ‘draft’ broke through the monotonous voice and frowning, Marco closed the door and went to the radio to turn it up.

His milk spoiled and the coffee never did get put away.

June 16.

Among the other dates drawn, that one burned through, ringing in Marco’s ears for hours. Even after he’d turned off the radio, he sat in silence, unable to completely comprehend what he’d heard. He didn’t move for a very long time, just stayed put and let it sink in.

He’d been drafted.

There was a war, and he was going to have fight in it.

It wasn’t as if he wasn’t aware of what had been happening in the world; Marco made it a point to keep himself educated on current events, and he’d been reading about the turmoil in Vietnam for months now. But it still seemed surreal to him. Surreal that his country was going to war. Surreal that he was going to be an active part of it. Surreal that if something happened to him, there wouldn’t be anyone on this stupid town to miss him.

The thought made him sick and it was only that he moved, bolting to the sink so that he didn’t vomit on the floor. As his already empty stomach attempted to turn itself inside out he considered the unfairness of the whole thing.

Normally Marco didn’t get angry at the world for not being fair but now seemed as good a time as any to start. The draft date was June 18. Two days after he would officially qualify for the draft. If the date had been just three days sooner, he would still be 17 and he wouldn’t have to go. He could stay and… And what exactly, he wondered to himself. He’d be barely graduated from high school, with not much luck at furthering that education, not with bills to pay, struggling as he already was. 

So maybe he shouldn’t be so mad, because this gave him a chance to see some part of the world other than the horrid town of Jinae. But he _was_ mad. He was livid. It just wasn’t fair. He was just a kid.

He finally found his voice.

He screamed.

He yelled.

He threw things.

And eventually he just slid back down against the wall and cried, his face buried in his hands.

 

Six months later and he was over the unfairness of it. He had resigned himself, reasoning that it was happening and there was no use being angry any more. 

But that didn’t stop him from being sad.

It was his eighteenth birthday. He stood, staring at the matching headstones of his parents, the still slightly chilly wind whistling through the trees and messing up his hair as he fought tears. He’d promised his mother, five years ago, that he would be strong for her, that he would live the best life he could, and that he wouldn’t see her again for a very long time.

“I’m gonna keep that promise,” he whispered, his voice drowned out by the air around him and his vision going blurry as he lost the battle against his tear ducts.

“And I’m gonna miss you guys. I don’t know when I’ll be able to see you next, but I promise I’ll always be thinking about you, okay?”

That was all he said, spending the rest of the day just sitting between the two graves, thinking about how odd it was that he was going to miss people who had already been gone from his life for a while.

June 18 came far too quickly, the day after his birthday barely a blur in his memory. The bus to basic training would pick him up at six that evening in Trost, a nearby town that Marco had never been to. It only took about a half an hour to get there, but Marco decided to go earlier. It was ten in the morning when he unloaded onto a Trost bust stop. Just looking around, Marco could tell Trost was quite a bit bigger that Jinae. 

He felt so completely out of place, dressed in his army greens and a backpack slung over his shoulder. He also felt very lost and very small. And very hungry, he realized as he spotted a small cafe across the street. It seemed like a good place to start, so he made his way over and found himself a small booth.

“What can I get you?”

Marco looked up at the question, meeting the eye of his waiter, a boy, about his age he’d guess with piercing golden eyes and a tawny-two toned undercut hairstyle. His features were all very sharp and angular and something about the boy struck Marco and he just sat staring dumbly at him for a few moments until the boy - Marco noticed his name tag read ‘Jean’ - spoke again,

“Hello? Anyone in there?” His tone would have seemed abrasive if Marco hadn’t caught in the hint of a smile on his lips.

“Uh.. yeah sorry. Um. Just a coffee for now..” he said for now, but the truth was, he didn’t have more than the 25 cents the cup would cost. The only other money he’d had had been for the bus fare to Trost.

“Cream or sugar?” 

“Um just.. just sugar please.”

Jean nodded, then headed toward the back to grab a fresh pot, shaking his head slightly as he went. The kid seemed so nervous. Though, going by his outfit, Jean guessed he had a reason to be. He wondered how a boy like that ended up getting drafted. He barely looked older than Jean himself, who was only seventeen. he shrugged it off though, just bringing out the coffee. 

As he poured the cup, Jean felt the boy’s eyes on him and he glanced up, smirking slightly, “Take a picture. It’ll last longer.” It was almost adorable the shade of red this poor kid turned at that.

“Sorry! I just…” He trailed off, but Jean could tell there was something else he wanted to say.

“Yes…?” he prompted.

The other swallowed, glancing away nervously, and in a quiet voice asked, “Sorry if this is a weird question but.. do you think you could.. I dunno just.. sit and talk with me for a bit?” He glanced up at Jean again as he finished his question and Jean noticed his eyes were the exact color of the coffee he had just poured, and that when he blushed, the freckles that littered his face became even more prominent. 

The truth was, Jean kind of did want to just that, but he was working, so he settled with, “How about we just start with a name?”

“Oh um.. Marco. It’s Marco,” and then _Marco_ blushed even deeper and Jean smiled lightly.

“Well Marco, tell you what, if you’ve got the time to stick around for a bit, I get off in an hour and then I know a great place to talk.

Marco eyes widened and he couldn’t believe what had just happened, “S-sounds good,” he offered in return, nodding maybe a little too enthusiastically. He smiled as he watched Jean go, and as he turned to his coffee, thinking about how the gesture felt strange, he realized he hadn’t smiled since the day his birthday was read on the radio, and yet Jean had easily drawn one onto his lips, just by agreeing to sit and talk with him.

Huh. That was something.

**Author's Note:**

> also this is 100% based off of [this](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6wRbo9FJ-yM) song


End file.
